SNY's Raab Says Coverage Has Been "Balanced" In First Five Years

It was five years ago today that SportsNet N.Y. launched as the Big Apple’s fourth RSN. The RSN is majority owned by the Mets, with cable operators Comcast and Time Warner Cable retaining partial ownership. In an interview with THE DAILY, SNY President Steve Raab reflects on the last five years.

Q: Is SNY where you expected it to be when it launched five years ago?

Raab: When we launched, we were focused on making sure that our studio programming and our Mets programming was going to be good. We needed to figure out our Jets partnership. And we were obviously focused on distribution. Other than that, we had so many internal staffing and administrative issues, that I can’t tell you honestly that I had a vision for what I wanted it to look like.

Q: What has SNY done especially well during the last five years?

Raab: We came out and said that our news coverage would be balanced and objective. That was met with a lot of skepticism. Looking back, there were certainly opportunities for our owners to waver, and nobody ever wavered. That really is the truth.